Rural Living Update!

I meant to write about this about two months ago. My boyfriend, Mr Kite (who is thinking of changing the spelling to Kyte), lives in a small cabin in his parents’ garden. There are two large vegetable patches that he and I are in charge of. This year we did very well, and managed to feed ourselves on home grown peas, broad and runner beans, chard, spinach, onions, potatoes, cabbage, salad, strawberries, courgettes, butternut squash, brussell sprouts, leeks, parsnips and carrots, plus the existing perennials such as apples, raspberries, herbs etc. We managed to harvest things from June onwards, and we’ve still got leeks, parsnips, spinach, and a carrot (plus the harvested stored veg.) I spent much of October preserving all of it. I made countless jars of chutney, jelly, jam and syrup; not just from our produce, but from the wild also. Here is a bad photograph of a tiny amount of our produce:



Now that the annual veg season is closing we’re focusing more on craft. I am learning to spin wool using a spinning wheel that belongs to my grandmother. I learnt what I know about it from my grandmother, which is the way it should be. I am half way through knitting my first scarf. I dabbled with knitting last year, but never got beyond a small square of material. Finally I have got the hang of it. I hope to be wearing my scarf before not too long. Mr Kite is setting up an indoor ‘pole’ lathe, but instead of a pole he is using bungee rope.
We’ve also finally got some chickens, who live in a large patch of garden under some trees. They are very happy in their new home, it seems. I like the sound they make. It’s so soft and gentle.

Mary and I learnt to weave a basket in October, which I might talk about another time. Here is a photo of our baskets anyhow:



Mine is the wonky, taller one. Mary has made a basket before, so she’s better at it than me. I store all of my wool and knitting needles in mine. I like it very much. Perhaps later this month, or next year, I will weave another.

Reviews, Preserves & Gymnastics

I have had a couple of reviews published on ezines recently. The first of which is a review of Lateralus by Tool for a Classic Albums section of the e-journal. You can read it here.

The second is a review of a wonderful book called a Handmade Life, please go here to read my review.

I’ve been having so much fun recently, away from my computer and involved instead in much more down-to-earth activities. Mary and I have been cooking in the woods a lot, but now she has gone off to live with Dick Strawbridge and co down in Cornwall for a while.

I’ve been making many jams and jellies, the most delicious of which being the Elderberry and Blackberry jam. Crab apple jelly was so, so yummy but Mr Kite and I went too far beyond the setting point and it has the consistency of Turkish Delight rather than jelly. Works beautifully well in jam tarts though.

The beetroot chutney I made is really good. I wish I had made more. Next plan is for some tomato chutney.

I have also started up gymnastics after a ten year hiatus. It’s incredible how my muscles remember what to do. I just run up to the springboard and then I do a handspring vault just as cleanly as I did when I was 14. When I was last a gymnast I suffered a lot from lack of confidence, and I never liked to do backwards things. I assumed I wasn’t built for gymnastics. Now I’m older and slightly more confident I know I can do these things if I put in the training. I learnt to do a backflick yesterday, which is something I was always much too afraid to try in my however many years of childhood gymnastics. I’ve managed to do front somersaults, handsprings and a dodgy backflick after just two sessions.